KEY VOTE ALERT “NO” ON H.R. 8015, THE DELIVERING FOR AMERICA ACT

Club for Growth opposes the Delivering for America Act, H.R. 8015. The legislation will be considered soon in the United States House of Representatives. The result of the vote will be included in the Club for Growth Foundation’s 2020 Congressional Scorecard.

The Delivering for America Act would provide $25 billion to the United States Postal Service (USPS), and prevent any change in operation or level of postal services during the COVID pandemic, including a reduction in hours of operations or consolidation of postal offices, among other provisions.

The legislation also allows Americans to bring frivolous civil action against the post office if an individual believes they were harmed by a violation of the bill. For example, if a post office decided to reduce its hours of operations and close early on a Saturday, or even close a satellite office while extending office hours in a main post office — an individual would have standing to sue the USPS. The USPS should be permitted to work with communities to respond to the postal needs of the people during COVID and Congress should not use a heavy hand to require all services to be fully maintained by USPS during the pandemic.

Despite competitive shipping costs associated with mailing items through the USPS, the USPS consistently loses billions of dollars annually because people use the post office less frequently in the era of digital and E-mail service. USPS’s unfunded pension system has also long been a red flag raised toward necessary reforms that too many politicians refuse to consider because of the political strength of the American Postal Workers Union.

USPS delivers billions of pieces of mail and hundreds of millions of packages during the holiday season alone, and USPS has the capacity to handle tens of millions of mail-in ballots during the 2020 election, if necessary, according to testimony this week from the Postmaster General. Moreover, the Postmaster General said the USPS can prioritize election documents over other mail. Despite the pandemic, USPS should be able to consider reforms like any other business responding to the pandemic that needs to reduce its operating loss. This bill is another case of politicians politicizing the COVID pandemic in order to obtain what they perceive as a political advantage headed into the General Election.

Club for Growth Foundation’s Congressional Scorecard for the 116th Congress provides a comprehensive rating of how well or how poorly each member of Congress supports pro-growth, free-market policies and will be distributed to the public.